Here is a recap of what happened in the search forums today, through the eyes of the Search Engine Roundtable and other search forums on the web.
Microsoft Bing was offline for a while today, taking down third-party sites like ChatGPT Search, DuckDuckGo and even its ad products. Google is testing special treatments for Reddit results in search. Google is testing from sources across the web without images. Google is testing replacing related search with people also search for. Google Ads has a referral program, not sure if that is new. Google updated its robots.txt parser code in GitHub.
Search Engine Roundtable Stories:
Google Tests Special Reddit Search Result Snippet Interface?
Google may be testing a special search result snippet interface for Reddit search results. In this test, Google seems to be showing the number of upvotes and the number of comments on the Reddit thread.
Bing Search Is Down; Takes Down DuckDuckGo, Ecosia, ChatGPT Search & More
Bing Search is currently down and/or having massive latency issues. The Bing home page loads a gray dull background, the Bing search results mostly loads errors pages and if it loads search results, those results are sparse. Plus, Bing’s APIs are down, so Microsoft Copilot and other services are down, including partners like DuckDuckGo, Ecosia, ChatGPT Search are all down.
Google Search: Sources Across The Web Without Images
The from sources across the web Google Search feature is testing showing results without image thumbnails. Google has reportedly been testing the imageless version since January of this year.
Google Tests Replacing Related Searches With People Also Search For?
Google may be testing replacing the “related searches” box with the “people also search for” box. The two are functionally not that different, from what I can tell.
Google Ads Referral / Affiliate Program
Did you know Google Ads has a referral or affiliate program. Where you can refer Google Ads a new advertiser and you will earn $250 in ad credits in Google Ads. I am not sure if this is new, but Anthony Higman thinks it might be new.
